Dear Lifehacker,
Converting videos for the iPod is so easy in iTunes, but I can't seem to get videos to play on my Android device. How can I convert videos so that they'll play in the native Android video player?

Sincerely,
Vexed by Video

Dear Vexed,
I actually wrestled with this recently myself. I tried configuring Handbrake manually, and my videos still wouldn't play. After a little while, just for giggles, I encoded a video using Handbrake's iPhone preset, and it played perfectly on my Droid. And, since the biggest difference between Android video compatibility and iPhone compatibility is the resolution, you can just use this preset and set the resolution yourself for easily playable videos on your phone.

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Every Android device is different, but you can take a look at your phone's tech specs page to see what your screen resolution is (for example, here's the Motorola Droid's page, which notes the screen resolution as 480x854).

Thus, to convert a video for your phone, open it up in Handbrake and hit the "iPhone & iPod Touch" profile in the right sidebar. Then, click on the Picture tab (or the "Picture Settings" button along the top of the HandBrake window, if you're on a Mac) and set the "Anamorphic" box to "loose". Change the width of the video to match the height of your phone's screen in pixels (since you'll be watching the movie with your phone in landscape format)—in the Droid's case, 854 (or the closest you can get to 854). Convert the video, and then connect your phone and copy it to your SD card. It should play through Android's Gallery app without a hitch.

It may seem obvious, but it took me a lot of manual fiddling before I realized that the iPhone setting would probably work fine. So hopefully those of you that are still having problems can use this method. Of course, if you have space to spare and would rather just watch DivX or MKV videos on your phone, you can always check out previously mentionedRockPlayer.